The Wandering Spirit
by theAdventurer0815
Summary: On her way through The Cut, Aloy encounters a young Banuk with an unusual story, and an evenly unusual request. A spoiler-free, original quest with two possible endings. [The Frozen Wilds DLC]
1. Chapter 1

**The Wandering Spirit**

The winds blowing through The Cut were nothing if but cruel in the way their icy touch froze Aloy's skin. She could hardly feel her limbs, let alone her fingers and face. Everything was so numb that her very skin could have turned into a layer of ice and she would not have noticed.

Having known in advance that she would travel to the land of everlasting snow, Aloy had put on her warmest clothes a long time before: A Banuk hunter's garb, padded with warm fur on the inside and sturdy metal plates on the outside. It had been more than enough to help her get through the snowy mountainside areas of the Sundom and the Sacred Land, but it was a poor match against the unrelenting cold of the wilderness in The Cut.

"Stupid traders will only trade for bluegleam...", Aloy muttered angrily out of her clattering teeth as she trotted along one of the Banuk's paths, a treasure map in her hands. In Songstone, she had set her eyes on an outfit that would be capable of protecting her from ice in any form, but unfortunately, the only resource that anyone would trade for in these parts was an immensely hard-to-find crystal called bluegleam. She had already spent much time on venturing into some far-off corners of The Cut to find some of it, and now, one more piece was all that she needed to complete the deal.

As Aloy raised her gaze from the map, a distant, indistinct sound of people's shouts caught her attention. Past the trees of the forest in front of her and the snow that was gently floating down from their tree tops, she could make out the shapes of four people as mere shadows against the blinding white of her surroundings.

From afar, she watched how one of the strangers pushed another off the path, sending him or her tumbling into a thick layer of snow, and then walked away as though nothing had happened at all.

"Looks like there's trouble ahead.", figured Aloy, packing the map away and hastening her steps. While she was slowly closing in on the stranger who had been left behind, she realized it was a young Banuk woman about the same age as she was. Like most of her tribe, she wore a blue garb and an impressive-looking headgear made of fur and machine plates. It didn't take long for her to spot the Nora once she had risen back to her feet.

"Outlander!", the stranger called over to her. "Outlander, I need your help!"

"Coming!", Aloy replied, before quickly putting the last steps behind her. As she stopped before the Banuk woman, she could see plainly by look on her face that she was in distress. "What happened?"

"I need you to help me stop those werak runners!", the stranger blurted out much too hasty. "I was trying to talk them out of it, but they wouldn't listen to me!"

"Stop them from what?", asked Aloy, who could not make much sense of her words. "Why don't you just tell me what happened from the very beginning?"

The stranger looked at her with a puzzled expression. "The very beginning?"

"How about names? Your name would be a good start.", suggested Aloy and gave her an encouraging smile. "I'm Aloy, and you are...?"

"The name's Tynka.", the Banuk woman finally introduced herself. "These werak, they've gone after a Ravager that's very special to me. They mustn't kill him!"

"A Ravager that's special to you…? So that means... you want to get the kill before they do?", guessed the freezing Nora, whilst rubbing a little bit of warmth into the exposed skin of her elbows. She had noticed how the Banuk had referred to the machine as a _'he'_ instead of an _'it'_ , and wondered whether that might have been just a slip of the tongue.

But it appeared that her words had only made Tynka more upset. "No, oh no! Quite the opposite!", she replied instantly. "This Ravager, he's docile! I know he doesn't want to hurt these hunters any more than I do."

Aloy eyed the stranger's painted face with curiosity. She knew she hadn't overridden any Ravagers lately, so it wasn't her doing behind this story, but she remembered the village the Banuk had built at the foot of a mountain and lived there together with a number of tame machines. All of that had ended some time ago, when a group of Oseram destroyed the device which had been sending an override signal to the machines in the area. With a quick motion, Aloy activated her focus and scanned the area, but it couldn't detect any signals nearby. Not even the kind of signal a Tallneck would send.

"Are there any more docile machines in The Cut?", she asked the Banuk in front of her.

"I don't think so...", replied Tynka, and sighed so deeply that it made her seem incredibly sad all of a sudden. "You see, this Ravager… he carries the spirit of my brother, Atek. That's why he's docile."

Although Aloy raised an eyebrow in surprise, she didn't believe that such a thing was truly possible. Machines carrying spirits in them? Yes, she knew that the Banuk believed in spirits and the power of the so-called blue light, but she didn't. The only reason why she didn't object now was because Tynka was about to explain in detail what had made her come to this unlikely conclusion.

"Atek spent a lot of time following and fighting this Ravager. He had chased the machine deep into The Cut. I was always on his heels, but he refused to let me help. He said that this was his personal ordeal, a personal rivalry between him and the Ravager. One day, he had caught up with it again, and, as usual, I stayed behind to watch as they fought once more. Atek jumped up and, with a mighty strike of his spear, he finally broke the cannon off the Ravager's back." For but a few moments Tynka had almost turned cheerful, yet the smile on her face had vanished all too quickly. "But there was a blast as it came loose, Atek was knocked back down, scorched and wounded… Before I could intervene, the Ravager was charging towards him again. I saw my brother getting back to his feet, hunting knife in his hand, and as the Ravager was about to run him over, he grabbed the machine by its head and clung to it with all the strength left in him… until it stopped rampaging." The young Banuk's eyes widened as she recalled the memory. "When my brother's limp body fell into the snow, the Ravager had become completely calm. It… _He..._ glanced at me. He saw me running towards them, but instead of turning hostile towards me, he just walked away, slowly. I had never seen a machine behave in such a way."

"So… You believe that your brother's spirit was passed on to the Ravager?", guessed Aloy, who was still sceptical, although, knowing what it was like to lose a family, she sympathized with the young Banuk.

"A few days ago, as I burned my brother's remains, I was certain.", Tynka claimed, full of conviction. "I noticed the blue light of the Ravager's gaze in the distance. At once, I grabbed my spear and followed his tracks into the wilderness, until today, when I saw this group of werak runners walking in front of me. They had picked up his trail as well and… because they seem to think he escaped the hunting grounds, they wish to take him down." With begging eyes the young Banuk huntress turned to Aloy again. "Please, I know it's an unusual request, but you must help me! It would be foolish to face three experienced werak members all by myself!"

"I will help you, Tynka.", Aloy assured her. "If what you say is true, this machine must truly be special. There certainly isn't another docile Ravager in the entire Cut."

Tynka nodded eagerly. "Then, let's be quick. They might be closing in on him already."

Even before she had finished the sentence, Aloy had already reactivated her focus and was scanning for the tracks of a Ravager this time. Not too far away from them, the focus had highlighted for her a series of imprints which laid hidden beneath a small layer of freshly-fallen snow. The form of the imprints matched the metal claws of a Ravager.

"This way!", Aloy instructed her companion, and lead the way along the creature's highlighted tracks.

It wasn't long until the edge of the forest came into view, marked by a steep descent in the terrain. In the distance, there were the sounds of men shouting, metal banging against metal, and a machine howling. It seemed that Aloy had spent too much time listening to Tynka's story… the fight had already begun without them. The Nora signalled her Banuk companion to stay behind. "You should let me do this on my own.", Aloy told her. There was no point in Tynka getting hurt in the fight, just because of a machine that may or may not carry the spirit of her brother.

"Don't talk to me as though I couldn't fight.", Tynka replied sternly and drew the spear from her back. "I let my brother fight by himself before, and it was a mistake I will not repeat!"

There was a determination in her eyes that could not be denied. The desire of a desperate sibling to save whatever was left to save of her family. In a way, Aloy respected her wish. Tynka was only doing was she thought was right… "Alright, if that is what you must do… But let me attempt to drive an arrow or two between them first. If I fail, you can still join the fight.", she suggested.

With a nod, Tynka took off to the right to look for a way to approach the werak sideways, while Aloy walked up to the peak of the hill in front of her, bow in hand and an arrow at the ready.

Below the young Nora huntress, the three werak runners were locked into a fight with the same Ravager that Tynka had described to her. Aloy recognized him easily by the missing cannon on his back. Yet despite of what the Banuk had told her, the machine didn't appear to be very tame. Just now, she witnessed as he charged towards one of the werak, almost trampling the man to his death. Another Banuk went for a quick revenge and lunged at the Ravager's side with his spear raised high, but the machine was quicker than him, turned around and knocked him out of the air back into the snow.

Was that really what a docile machine looked like? Aloy knew from experience that even overridden machines would turn against humans, if those humans were classified as hostile towards her. But she couldn't tell who had overridden that Ravager – if anyone at all. Seeking the help of her focus, Aloy reached up to her temple. It scanned the combatants quickly, and, to Aloy's surprise, it identified all of them as _'FRIENDLY'_ – even the Ravager.

"Now what am I going to do?", she whispered to herself.

 **[CHOOSE]**

Stop the Ravager **[Jump to Chapter 2]**

 **OR:**

Stop the werak **[Jump to Chapter 3]**


	2. Chapter 2

**[You chose to s** **top the Ravager from attacking** **the werak]**

"It's going to kill those men if I don't do anything about it!", Aloy muttered angrily out of gritted teeth. Then, she quickly stuffed the hunter's arrow back into her quiver and drew a handful of shock arrows instead. Their smooth wood brushed against her hand as she drew back the bow string.

Taking aim at the power cells located left and right of the Ravager's spine was not exactly easy, given the fact that it was moving around quite a lot while trying to knock down the hunters. With patience, Aloy observed its movements until she was able to anticipate where it would land after its next jump backwards. Only then she let the arrows spring from her bow. Although they spread during flight, one of them hit its target, sending a shockwave of electricity into the power cell.

It supercharged only a split second after, the component burst, and thus paralysed the entire machine. Twitching and howling, the Ravager was locked into place while the werak stepped back from the electricity which crackled around it.

For the moment, one might argue that the machine had become harmless, but Aloy knew that the effect of the blast would not last for very long. She had only gained time for the werak and herself to finish what they had started. Her hand went back to her quiver to draw a precision bow from it. A well-placed shot should put an end to this machine's artificial life with ease.

" **No! What are you doing?!"** , Tynka suddenly cried. **"You agreed to help me!"** With her spear in her hand, the young Banuk huntress was running towards the Ravager – possibly to place herself in the way of Aloy's arrows and the werak's spears.

"I'm sorry, Tynka.", Aloy whispered to herself while she quickly mocked the arrow and drew the bow. "But you were mistaken. _He_ is not your brother, and _he_ is not harmless." The arrow flew long before Tynka had a chance to keep Aloy from shooting and its head was pointed at one set of the Ravager's glowing eyes.

By the time the young Banuk reached the machine, the arrow had already buried itself into its head deeply, and the machine's legs just gave in under the loss of power. Tynka stopped for a short moment to witness her special Ravager collapse, before she noticed the werak runner about to bury his spear into the mechanical beast's insides. In a desperate, and perhaps foolish, attempt, she stepped between them. Although she swung her own swear to deflect the attack from the machine, Aloy watched in horror as a splash of red hot blood stained the perfect white canvas that was the snow to Tynka's feet.

Once the werak had withdrawn the tip of his spear from the young Banuk's body, she stumbled a few, last steps back before collapsing against the Ravager's metal plated chest. She had gone limp almost instantly, which could only mean that the strike of the spear had been fatal.

There remained, however, a single spark of life inside of the machine. Its movements were jagged, and the light in its undamaged eye was blinking unsteadily – an arrow was sticking out of the other – but still it raised its heavy head a last time. The way it moved, it attempted to get a glance at Tynka, but halfway through the motion it collapsed back to the ground and stopped moving. Eventually, the sound of whirring machinery faded, too.

With faltering breath, Aloy hurried down the hill and skidded through the snow to reach the group of Banuk hunters staring at the young woman and the Ravager next to her. She could see all too plainly that the hands of the man who had, by accident, delivered the killing blow, were shaking.

One of the others ran up to him and took him by the shoulders aside to calm him down. "It wasn't your fault. It was an accident!", he immediately claimed. "She threw herself in front of your spear."

"She had seen something in the beast that could not be.", said the third of the werak runners.

Although she heard their words, their meaning was lost to Aloy completely as she was met by the blank gaze of a dead Tynka who rested motionless against the machine's chest. Where had all of this gone wrong? Had she underestimated the young huntress' determination to save this machine? Should she have declined the request to help from the start?

One of the werak runners turned to Aloy. "What is your business here, outlander?", he demanded to know and stared at her with the bitter, almost emotionless expression that she had seen on so many Banuk faces.

Although she was hardly ever at a loss for words, in this moment, her heart felt like big lump of ice, and she failed to think of anything to reply. She couldn't bring herself to tell them that she had saved their lives, albeit at the unexpected cost of Tynka's. With a heavy sigh, she turned away from the scene.

As she left them to cast judgement on the man who struck Tynka down, and to take care of the huntress' body, the young Nora seeker felt as though the winds in The Cut had just become even sharper.


	3. Chapter 3

**[You chose to stop the werak from attacking the Ravager]**

"He is just defending himself… If I can stop the werak from attacking, he should calm down again.", figured Aloy, although she was quite nervous. If she was mistaken, this could go very, very wrong. But a decision had to be made and for now, she had decided to place her trust into Tynka's story of the tame Ravager carrying a man's spirit inside its metal casing.

The Nora huntress drew her bow, yet instead of taking aim at either of the fighters, she was looking for an opening between them to shoot at. Patiently, she waited until both sides were taking a short pause by circling around each other before she let the arrow spring from her bow.

With a muffled sound, it disappeared in the thick layer of snow, but the sudden object zipping past the Banuk hunters had caught their attention anyway. To make sure they got the right idea, Aloy shot a few more arrows into the ground to their feet, until the series of holes drew a distinct line between the Ravager and the werak runners.

" **Leave this machine alone!"** , she let her voice follow the last arrow.

" **Keep away, outlander! This is** **not** **your** **fight** **!"** , one of the men shouted back. He turned away from the machine only for a short moment to try and spot Aloy up on the hill.

Meanwhile, the Ravager was slowly backing away from his attackers. A low growling escaped his insides, along with a quiet gurgling noise. Despite the sparks flying from his body, he didn't show any sign of weakness.

Of course it didn't take long for the hunters to notice the machine's slow retreat. **"** **Do not let it get away!"** , one of them ordered his comrades.

The longer Aloy watched the Ravager, the more certain she became of Tynka's words. He seemed as though he could just turn and run – if given the chance – which was something no ordinary combat machine would ever do. Quickly, the Nora huntress mocked a set of three arrows on her bow and fired them in front of the werak runners before one of them could lunge at the Ravager again.

" **This machine poses no threat to you!",** she called over to the men. **"It** **i** **s not worth the fight!"**

" **This is not for you to decide!"** , came the reply from the leader of the hunting party. **"You are overstepping your mark, outlander!"** Before Aloy had the chance to justify her demand, he gave another hunter a sign to go and deal with her.

Perhaps it was a good time to abandon this favourable shooting spot now and to join the fray at the foot of the hill. She decided not to wait until the werak runner had reached her, and began the descent a little early.

But she wasn't the only one who was heading towards the fight to protect a mechanical beast. Tynka, too, came running out of the bushes now, and, unlike Aloy, she had the moment of surprise on her side. At least she was able to run past the other hunters without any hindrance, and within seconds she was at the Ravager's side. As expected, the machine took notice of her, but didn't attack.

At about the same time, once Aloy had come to a halt after skidding across a slippery patch of ice hidden underneath the snow, she was greeted with raised spears by two of the werak runners. Although she was confident enough to be able to take both of them on, she had no intention to hurt them if it was not necessary, which was why she put her bow away and raised her hands in defence.

"If you do not believe me, just take a look...", Aloy said to them, and, with a light smile, she nodded into the direction of Tynka and the Ravager.

Behind them, Tynka was carefully reaching for the machine's head. The Ravager seemed almost perfectly calm now. He stared back at the young Banuk, and allowed her to touch the protective plating which formed his cheek. "Are you alright?", Tynka asked him, although no response could be expected. Still, the sparks flying from the Ravager's shoulder and the oily blue fluid that was slowly trickling into the snow beneath of him answered for the machine. Eventually, he let out a noise resembling an animal's whine.

Baffled by the strangely friendly behaviour of the beast, the hunters hardly noticed Aloy walking past them. "Great Banukai!", someone exclaimed.

They were all watching when the machine slowly laid down into the snow. Aloy could see rather plainly why he did so, now that she was almost as close to the beast as Tynka. The blue light shining out of its power cells and eyes was dimming, the power drain caused by the damages slowly getting the better of him. She didn't quite dare to tell the young huntress how serious the damages truly were, because Tynka appeared to be almost absorbed in the Ravager's stare.

"Don't… Don't go yet!", she asked of the machine. "There was a reason that you had to live on, but what was it?" By dropping to her knees, she followed him to the ground. " _What was it?_ ", she repeated in a sharper tone.

Up to this point, the Ravager had still been able to keep its head raised, but when the power loss reached critical levels, even that was no longer possible. Tynka's hands at either side of the machine's heavy head made it seem as though she was gently lowering it to the ground. Through the silence of a winter's day echoed a metallic whine, the last sound ever to be heard by this mechanic creature before the blue light of its eyes faded away.

Even Aloy, who was usually looking at machines with a rational mind, was almost tempted to believe that this sound had been an expression of deep inner regret and heartfelt sadness. "I'm sorry, Tynka...", she began quietly, "...but the damages have been too severe."

When the Banuk huntress didn't reply, Aloy squatted down next to her. Tynka was stroking the tips of her gloved fingers across the metal casing of the machine's head. Hidden beneath the shadow of her headgear, Aloy could not see the huntress' face. What she did see, however, was the broken blade of a hunting knife sticking out of the hidden data core inside of the Ravager's head.

"Atek… You did so much for me. All this time, and I never thanked you...", the young Banuk whispered softly. "Thank you, Atek."

"Listen, Tynka.", Aloy attempted to carefully draw her attention. "I hate to break this to you, but your brother is long gone… this Ravager was only tame because of a malfunction…"

There was a sigh, followed by a… rather surprising response.  
"I know.", answered Tynka as she lifted her hand away from the machine. "But it was a malfunction that my brother caused. It was his doing." She raised her head and looked into Aloy's face. Not a trace of a tear had broken the triangular lines of paint on her face.

"By our actions, we live on.", she explained full of conviction.

"I see..."  
Spirit or not, the conclusion remained the same. Finally, Aloy fully understood how the relation between the Ravager and Tynka's deceased brother came to be.

"And now, I think, I understand why Atek wanted to live on.", continued Tynka, and while she spoke, her expression slowly lightened up. "He died so quickly, he never had the chance to say good-bye. But by changing this Ravager – his Ravager – he saved me from the beast's savage nature, and allowed me to say the words he had deserved to hear." When the young Banuk rose back to her feet, Aloy stood up as well. "And I have to thank you as well, for keeping him safe.", Tynka added.

Although Aloy smiled back at her, she had to admit that this was not quite true. "Well, I wouldn't say I succeeded… After all, he didn't make it."

"I don't think that either of us could have done much about the damages he had suffered already.", revealed Tynka. "However, you did keep him safe long enough for me to catch up to him, and that's what counts."

"If you say so..."

From a bag on her belt, Tynka drew a small piece of bluegleam, which glittered in brilliant hues of blue and purple against the light of the winter's sun. Aloy could hardly believe her eyes when the Banuk huntress held it out to her. "Here, I want you to have this. For taking part in this, the last verse of my brother's song."

One moment later, the crystal dropped into Aloy's half-frozen palm. "Thank you, Tynka. I will put this bluegleam to good use.", she promised. As she cast a glance over her shoulder, she saw the werak members standing and staring at what had happened before them, some of them looking a little guilty. Had they destroyed the Ravager before its time, they would not have witnessed these parting moments between a huntress and a machine.

They hardly stirred when Aloy walked past them, apart from looking her way. On the edge of the clearing, the Nora seeker raised her hand and waved back at Tynka.

Very soon, she thought, the Cut would become a little less harsh, a little less cold


End file.
